‘Didsbury.’
‘The poor bloody woman probably hasn’t got Alzheimer’s at all.’
‘No, she has. They’ve just done a scan at the MRI and she’s got the lesions apparently.’
‘Well, I don’t know where this Goulden chap had the script prepared but it must be some Mickey Mouse setup. Four times the stated dosage. I ask you.’
‘Which chemist does it say on the label?’ I couldn’t remember.
‘I haven’t got them here,’ she snapped. ‘They’re still with the lab. They’ll be notifying the police as a matter of course.’
‘The police?’
‘Christ, yes. This sort of slipshod practice just isn’t on. These are powerful drugs being dished out by some incompetent pharmacist who shouldn’t be allowed to make up lucky bags, let alone medicines. I’ve left my name as a contact seeing as I sent the sample in but I’d better check with you I’ve got the facts right.’
We went over dates and times, names and places until Moira was clear about the sequence of events that had led to me leaving the tablets with her.
It was ironic really. If the scan that Mr Simcock had done hadn’t shown advanced organic changes to Lily’s brain then Agnes’ early suspicions that her decline was too rapid and could be due to some external factors could have been spot on. The high dosage and the combination of drugs would be enough to make anyone demented, Moira had said. Take her off the medication and the symptoms will go. It seemed terribly unfair that Lily actually had Alzheimer’s. I needed to tell Agnes about Moira’s news, although given the outlook for Lily and her current illness I thought there’d be cold comfort in the knowledge that there had been something amiss with the thioridazine tablets.
Something else niggled too. Goulden’s reaction to the tablets going missing. Was it simply over-zealous housekeeping or had he realised there was something wrong with them? Maybe he’d simply never got round to reducing the dosage as he’d promised us, and was covering his tracks. Or perhaps he’d realised there’d been some big cock-up at the chemists and didn’t want anyone to know. Why? No skin off his nose, surely. If he wanted to protect his own reputation as a doctor it’d be in his interest to have the chemist struck off for such negligence.
I wondered what Mrs Knight, the matron’s, part in all this was. She who lied about the retrieval of the bottle. What had prompted that? Had Goulden confided in her? I checked the clock. Ray was collecting Maddie and Tom, Friday afternoon being an early finish, in the time-honoured tradition of the building trade. If I set off now I could probably catch Mrs Knight before she left for home.